Malcolm Brown casually walked the halls of his abode. In his youth, he had hated the anonymity produced by his surname; the son of a nameless colonist in a sea of folk coming to the new world. He had looked with seething envy at shops and goods emblazoned with a family’s name; a family whose reputations and faces were well known and regarded. In Jamestown alone there a dozen Browns with no relation to one another. Some were shoddy businessmen: “Oh, you’re that Brown,” said with disdain. Others were reputable and admired: “Oh! You’re that Brown,” said with enthusiasm. Travel even an hour away to another town and likely a Brown, Smith, or similarly monikered individual would be ignored,having no reputation at all — the name might not even be genuine.
While the anonymity had galled him then, tonight he appreciated his facelessness. Who he was could never be taken away from him. His grip on his small empire was too ironclad. His full name struck fear, awe, or a mixture of both in those who knew of him, but his simple surname served well as a camouflage that allowed him to move about in modern society with fluid ease.
Ever since his first manor, he had fallen into the habit of pacing and admiring his collection in naught but a parlor robe while sipping a preferred beverage. The bold flavors of his drink faded from his tongue over time, but that didn’t matter. It was the image, to his staff, his guests, and himself which mattered — and which he thoroughly enjoyed. Breakfast served the purpose of nourishment, not this symbolic drink, so what did it matter that it was now bland as water?
This particular wall featured the evolution of firearms owned and used by his hereditary bodyguards and lineage through the years. A musket from the American Revolution, a “modern” musket from the American Civil War, breech-loaders, revolvers, semi-automatics, assault rifles, and machine guns. Scattered among them as accents were sample rounds and loads, bows and arrows ranging from native construction with flint heads, to compound and crossbows with specialized heads for a wide variety of purposes. He took pride, not just in the extent of this private museum-quality collection, but in the memorized knowledge of precisely which pieces were functional, to what extent, what ammunition went with which weapons and a precise accounting of how many remained of each irreplaceable type.
A slight shuffle behind him broke his revery, but didn’t shatter it. He concluded his mental litany before turning to the source of the sound.
“Good evening, my prince,” the figure said, bowing low. The window to give greetings before being spoken to was short and required attentiveness. Malcolm's smile was subtle. Gaspard, a long time family servant and somewhat recent appointee as Sheriff over his domain, had not lost his touch.
“Good evening. What has my pet rat to say tonight?” Malcolm asked as he casually, yet purposely, strode toward the hunched figure on a path to pass for destinations beyond, expecting that his manservant would fall into step beside and slightly behind. At this point in Gaspard's tenure, it was understood that “rat” especially when preceded by “pet” was merely a commentary on the nature of his skills and tasks, and not an insulting or derogatory remark. The prince would even swear that the man enjoyed the comparison.
“Still no word from your colleagues in Las Vegas, the Twin Cities, Seattle, Vancouver, Winnipeg, Calgary, or Edmonton,” rasped Gaspard.
“Incompetents,” Malcolm muttered, then more audibly to his master-spy: “But?”
“But, neither have any of my contacts in the dozens of smaller cities in between. I even reached out to some 'friends' in San Antonio, Houston, Santa Fe, Tucson, Phoenix--nothing. It would appear that your ‘prodigal son’ has either been scorched by the sun, or been spirited away by the Inquisition,” the hunched man continued. Despite his malformed appearance, he was visibly prepared to leap back from whatever violent repercussion his less than glowing report might precipitate.
“And we are sure Prince Joseph isn’t secretly holding him somewhere in Salt Lake City?” Malcolm asked, his brow furrowed with intense anger at the utter tracelessness of a single kindred.
“Explicitly,” came Gaspard’s one-word answer. A splash of red and glittering glass shards scattered across the marble tile floor with a sharp crash an instant later as his master furiously hurled his glass downward without breaking stride.
“Cassidy!” he bellowed, expecting his head maid to promptly see to it that the mess was pristinely cleaned without specific instruction to do so.
“Some breakfast, your highness?” Gaspard casually suggested in an attempt to subtly placate his master’s rage.
“Anticipate replenishing my herd, Gaspard,” the prince growled as he strode up to grandiose double doors. His sudden entrance startled the dozen or so individuals beyond. Scant-clad at best, the people here clearly enjoyed a sedate lifestyle of constant carnal pleasure, the latent sanguine state of their faces a stark contrast to the new fear in their eyes at the clearly agitated mood of their host. That is, all except two lovers who couldn’t be bothered to pause their passions long enough to acknowledge the prince’s arrival.
Terror and pity silently coursed through the sheep as they watched the master of the fold stride in unbridled rage towards the couple. Effortlessly, he clamped down one hand on the back of each of their necks and turned them both to face him. Whether it was his unfettered fury, the delicious terror in their wide eyes, or merely the Hunger in his belly taking control of his senses, his presence crashed over them as he growled, “Bite your lover’s neck and tear out their blood!” As soon as he utter the macabre command, their eyes glazed over. They turned back towards the other, then entwined their necks in an effort to best sink their plain teeth murderously into someone they had just been copulating with a moment prior. The soft, sickening tear of flesh sang in Malcolm’s ears like a counterpoint to the pitched cries of pain as his two pets bit and tore into each other. He restrained himself to enjoy the display of animalistic carnage and revel in his own power over mortals, before the gnawing instinct to feed overcame his own narcissism and he joined in to gorge himself on the lifeblood of both.
A quiet ecstatic moan behind him momentarily distracted him from the rush of predatorial power. With a curious glance, he saw all but one of his pets either staring at him mortified or burying their faces in pillows, blankets, their neighbors — anything to avoid the ire of his gaze. The one exception lay on a chaise lounge, her head lolled backwards into the shoulder of a black-hooded figure, who was presently licking her bare neck. The Rat made eye contact briefly, then bowed in respect and thanks, his own hunger sated, mostly, for the time being.
Once he was done, Malcolm stood to his full height with an eerie calm, the lifeless corpses of his former pets still locked in his fists. As he began to step away, he released them simultaneously; they ragdolled to the floor with a sickening smack. “Cassidy!” he bellowed again. Perhaps she was being more attentive now that he had summoned her twice in less than a half-hour; perhaps she was simply nearby now because she had already begun cleaning the first mess. Either way, in mere seconds a brawny, bowed woman appeared in the doorway. Between her tattered and stained attire, rotundly muscular build, poor stature, and homely face, she was by no means attractive; far more utilitarian than a mere wall-flower or decoration.
“Clean up this mess! Make sure the rest of the herd only remembers what they need to,” he commanded without breaking stride. His order given, he snapped his fingers and the hunched form of Gaspard fell in beside him, his prey happily writhing in the fading throes of his ministrations.
The troll of a woman in the doorway turned a hungry eye on the remaining occupants of the chamber as she absently stepped out of her master’s path. The men and women stared in silent terror. The perpetual euphoria of drink, food, pleasure, and idle existence lay like glass shards about them; the bestial carnage had in the moment rendered them impotent and helpless against the power and will of their host. No, their master; their owner. Like needles of ice freezing their veins, sobriety pierced the haze as they realized they were slaves, lured by their own lists and vices, little more than cattle to these monsters that only vaguely now appeared human.
As the grand doors shut behind him, penning in the herd and cougar together, Malcolm sighed deeply — a deliberate act, since he did not need to breathe, and one that resonated with the extra wheeze of dusty air forced through a decrepit bellows. His head swam lightly with ecstasy from two kills in quick succession, a soothing sensation that slowly washed down his spine to his extremities. The rage that had begun to manifest as a throbbing ache deep in his antiquated bones now mellowed into a warm balm in his marrow. The fog of frustration lifted and his thoughts crystallized. Passingly, the thought occurred that Cassidy would likely abuse her assignment, as he rarely allowed her to feed on his personal herd. However, his order had been delivered in equal parts explicit and vague; precisely how she would cause them to forget the “dear departure” of the dead couple was left up to her, but he trusted she would ensure they remembered nothing and remained docile, or else risk the undivided attention of his wrath.
“Gaspard,” he stated into the hall without sparing a glance to see if his manservant was present: the rat knew to follow in his master’s shadow. “Fetch the oracle. I want her to come here, to use her powers, and to pierce the veil to tell me. I need to know: Where is the whelp?”
“As you wish, my prince,” rasped the cloaked figure as he turned to depart. With silent swiftness, he departed his master’s shadow and padded towards an open doorway, fading from view as if passing through a curtain in the air.
With the animalistic rage of his gut quelled and his red haze lifted from his mind, he focused his thoughts onto the series of events that had lead to this. Lynda Myrikov, a blood-witch by some accounts and gifted seer by others, had foretold that a single mortal would precede the extinction of their kind: the night walkers, the children of Caine or Lilith (depending), the damned, the blood-suckers--vampires. Somehow, this singular human would lead all the forces and factions of the Second Inquisition on a worldwide conquest to exterminate every single Kindred in existence, even finding and destroying hidden elders of the oldest generations as they slept in torpor. Such a threat could not be ignored. Malcolm had insisted she be provided the resources needed to identify this mortal, without mistake or error. A coterie of hunters was then assigned to find and end him. In what was thought to be cruel irony, they were allowed to utterly break him — strip every shred of his humanity, turn him into the worst of them, and when he either committed a fatal trespass or proved unbreakable, he would be destroyed. Instead, Christopher Blake seemed the perfect pet project: an attentive student to the ways of the Ivory Tower and its traditions, a soulless killer with tactical precision and guile.
Looking at everything now, it seemed obvious that although Christopher had clearly been oblivious to the existence of kindred society before he was embraced, the attempts to break him and destroy his humanity had failed and, despite being a fledgling, he had somehow managed to orchestrate the final deaths of every member of the coterie that had been involved in turning him. Some in Malcolm’s court urged that the lost sheep be captured and brought back into the fold, shown the error of his ways. Most, however, found his apparent disdain for the very blood in his veins not only a social afront, but a heresy — the alleged codename for him by the Second Inquisition -- Priest -- only compounding this opinion within the mob. This insolent upstart needed to burn for his crimes.
Now dressed for the night, Malcolm paced across his estate from his personal resting chambers to the decadent ballroom that most commonly used to hold court, but periodically used to host extravagant parties for the wealthy and influential around his city. Tonight was an occasion for the former. Reverently quiet, the chamber echoed softly with soft murmurs as the early arrivals greeted and discussed with one another. He held various traditions of how he welcomed guests: sequence and order of precedence, time spent in each initial conversation until formalities were completed and propriety would allow for less socialization and more political and official business. He noticed that one of his court’s most prominent wall-flowers, Odessa le Mueur, was already present, clad in classic roaring 20’s fashion as appropriate for the decade when she was embraced. The fact she was the great-grand daughter of the woman Malcolm had pined after when he himself was mortal had virtually nothing to do with his appreciation of her. She was good at being seen without being threatening; alluring without being memorable; present without being noticed; attentive without being obtrusive. In short, she was an exquisite social spy--something that the introduction of vampiric powers had only enhanced in her. She stood, leaning relaxedly against one of the colonade pillars, on full display as a thing of morbid beauty, yet unimpeded to the flow and energy of the room. He smiled inwardly. He would greet her last, wanting her to observe all other interactions and report anything of note that she detected.
It was time to put aside the problem with the prodigal childe for the moment and focus on the true passion of his unlife: the Dance of Politics.
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